He Told A Man To Shut Up While Interviewing Him Since He Couldn’t Stop Talking About Himself
Interviews are about more than skills; they’re about chemistry, awareness, and knowing when to stop talking and start listening.
He tried to stay patient. He gave the candidate every opportunity to engage, collaborate, and be human. But when the guy steamrolled through every question, talked over his coworker, and treated the interview like a one-person monologue, something in him snapped.
Now he’s replaying how it ended, and wondering if brutal honesty makes you unprofessional, or just real.
This man recently interviewed a guy for an excellent position in software engineering. The candidate managed to pass the first screening round, and everyone at his company was excited about the experience and resume this guy came with.
The guy was actually perfect on paper, and he was thrilled about how the job would change this man’s life if he got the offer.
“Then he shows up, very serious and not smiling at all. I’m used to that in tech interviews, and I understand it can be an intimidating environment,” he explained.
“We did a round of introductions, and then he opened the interview by saying, ‘Let me tell you a little bit about myself.’ We said, okay, go for it.”
“He started talking and talking about his personal and professional background. After about three minutes, I jumped in to ask a follow-up question based on something he mentioned. He replied, ‘I will answer, just give me a moment,’ and continued talking.”
One of his coworkers then tried to interject with a completely different question, and the man shut her down in the same way before droning on about himself.
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He and his coworker exchanged glances, but they allowed the guy to keep talking, as they didn’t want to assume the worst that early on in the interview.
However, more than five minutes had elapsed, and the guy was still going on about his accolades. He had to talk over the guy to try to ask him a question.
The man eventually took a breath to answer, but he did it in such a tedious, prolonged fashion that he wound up going on a tangent about something completely unrelated.
His coworker intervened with a second question of her own, and the guy did the exact same thing to her. He and his coworker were so fed up that they wanted the interview to be over and done with.
The guy was not taking the hint as he kept calm and tried to finish things off. He had no choice but to raise his voice a bit and ask if the man had any questions for them.
This is actually a procedure they follow in the company to help them prep for additional interviews, and he figured it was a great strategy to move this guy along.
The man did have a question for them about their team, and before he could get an answer out, the man raised up a finger and spoke over him, once more steering the topic to his background!
“I let it go. Then he asked another question, which my coworker started to answer, but again, he spoke over her to talk about himself,” he continued.
“I tried once more to interrupt politely, but he kept talking. At that point, I was done. I said, ‘John, you really have to shut up and listen.” He was surprised, as was my coworker, but he finally stopped talking. I continued, “You walked into this room with a 99 percent chance of getting the job. Now that chance is zero. The only reason is because, in less than fifteen minutes, you’ve demonstrated that you don’t have the capacity to listen at all. So I’m telling you now, you’re not getting the job. But if you take anything away from this interview, let it be this: no matter how good you are technically, if you can’t listen, you’ll never excel in this career.'”
“He apologized and said, ‘Can we start again?’ I replied, ‘You had your chance. Best of luck in your future interviews. Make sure you listen.’ Looking back, I know I could have handled that differently, but I still feel bad for the guy.”
Do you think he should feel terrible for how he handled the interview?
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